may have taught him that tender sympathy with the sufferings of others, which is often so soothing to the sick heart, and he might speak of peace to me! I am sadly distressed here for want of books; the few which, with such a quantity of necessary baggage, I was able to bring with me, I have now exhausted; and though my good friend, monsieur Bergasse, has sent me some from Paris, they happen to be such as I cannot read with any pleasure. I have supposed it not impossible that the monk might supply me from the library of his convent. This deficiency of books has compelled me to have recourse to my pen and my pencil, to beguile those hours, when my soul, sickening at the past, and recoiling from the future, would very fain lose its own mournful images in the witchery of fiction. I have found, however, a melancholy delight in describing these sufferings. I usually take my evening seat on the flight of steps I have described to you. Sometimes, when I am in more tranquil spirits, I sketch, in my port folio, the wild flowers and weeds that grow among the buildings where I sit; in some parts, ivy holds together the broken piles of brick from whence the cement has fallen; the stone crop, and the toad flax cover or creep among the masses of disjointed marble; several sorts of antirhinum still wave their pink and purple blossoms along the edges of the wall; and last night I observed mingled with them, a root of the field poppy, still in flower. The following Account of the Locusts LOCUSTS are produced from some unknown, physical cause, and proceed from the desert, always coming from the south. When they visit a country it behoves every individual to lay in a provision against a famine; for they are said to stay three, five, or seven years. During my residence in West and South Barbary, those countries suffered a visitation from them during seven years. They have a government among themselves, similar to that of the bees and ants; and when the sultan Jerraad, king of the locusts, rises, the whole body follow him, not one solitary straggler being left behind to witness the devastation. When they have eaten all other vegetation, they attack the trees, consuming first the leaves, and then the bark, so that the country, in the midst of summer, from their unsparing rapacity, bears the face of winter. In my travels, I have seen them so thick on the ground, as sometimes actually to have covercd my horse's hoofs as he went along. It is very annoying to travel through of Africa is from Jackson's Morocco. a host of them, as they are continually flying in your face, and settling on your hands and clothes. At a distance, they appear, in the air, like an immense cloud, darkening the sun; and whilst employed in devouring the produce of the land, it has been observed that they uniformly proceed one way, as regularly as a disciplined army on its march; nor will it be possible to discover a single one going a different way from the rest. In travelling from Mogodor to Tangier, before the plague in 1799, the country was covered with them. A singular incident then occurred at El Araiche; the whole country from the confines of Sahara to that place was ravaged by them, but after crossing the river Él Kos, they were not to be seen, though there was nothing to prevent them from flying across it. Moreover, they were all moving that way, that is to to the north; but when they reached the banks of the river, they proceeded eastward, so that the gardens and fields north of El Araiche were full of vegetables, fruits, and grain. The Arabs of the province of El Garb considered this remarkable circumstance, as an evident interposition of Providence. This curse of heaven can only be conceived by those who have seen the dismal effects of their devastation. The poor people, by living on them, become meagre and indolent, for no labour will yield fruit, whilst the locusts continue increasing in numbers. In the rainy season they partially disappear, and at the opening of the spring the ground is covered with their young. Those crops of corn which are first mature, and the grain which becomes hardened before the locust attains its full growth, are likely to escape, provi ded there be other crops less forward for them to feed upon. In the year 1799, these destructive insects were carried away into the Western Ocean by a violent hurricane; and the shores were afterwards covered with their dead bodies, which, in many places, emitted a pestilential smell; that is, wherever, the land was low, or where the salt water had not washed them. To this event succeeded a most abundant crop of corn, the lands which had lain fallow for years, being now cultivated; but the produce of the cultivation was accompanied with a most infectious and deadly plague, a calamity of which the locusts have often been observed to be the forerunners. [From the Asiatick Researches.] NUPTIAL CEREMONIES AMONG THE HINDOOS. THE ceremonies, of which the nuptial solemnity consists, may be here recapitulated. The bridegroom goes in procession to the house where the bride's father resides, and is there welcomed as a guest. The bride is given to him by her father, in the form usual at every solemn donation, and their hands are bound together with grass. He clothes the bride with an upper and lower garment, and the skirts of her mantle and his are tied together. The bridegroom makes oblations to fire, and the bride drops rice on it as an oblation. The bridegroom solemnly takes her hand in marriage. She treads on a stone and mullar. They walk round the fire. The bride steps seven times, conducted by the bridegroom; and he then dismisses the spectators, the marriage being now complete and irrevocable. In the evening of the same day, the bride sits down on a bull's hide, and the bridegroom points out to her the polar star as an emblem of stability. They then partake of a meal. The bridegroom remains three days at the house of the bride's father. On the fourth day, he conducts her to his own house in solemn procession. She is there welcomed by his kindred, and the solemnity ends with oblations to fire. Among the Hindoos, a girl is married before the age of puberty. The law even censures the delay of her marriage beyond the tenth year.For this reason, and because the bridegroom, too, may be an infant, it is rare that a marriage should be consummated until long after its solemnization. The recital of prayers on this occasion constitutes it a religious ceremony; and it is the first of those that are performed for the purpose of expiating the sinful taint which a child is supposed to contract in the womb of its mother. On the practice of immature nuptials, a subject suggested in the preceding paragraph, it may be remarked, that it arises from a laudable motive: from a sense of duty incumbent on a father, who considers as a debt, the obligation of providing a suitable match for his daughter. This notion, which is strongly inculcated by Hindoo legislators, is forcibly impressed on the minds of parents. But, in their zeal to dispose of a daughter in marriage, they do not, perhaps, sufficiently consult her domestick felicity. By the death of an infant husband, she is condemned to virgin widowhood for the period of her life. If both survive, the habitual bickerings of their infancy are prolonged in perpetual discord. Numerous restrictions in the assortment of matches impose on parents this necessity of embracing the earliest opportunity of affiancing their children to fit companions. The intermarriages of different classes, formerly permitted, with certain limitations, are now wholly forbidden. The prohibited degrees extend to the sixth of affinity; and even the bearing of the same family name is a sufficient cause of impediment. Humboldt's Observations on the Gymnotus Electricus, or Electrick Eel. THE terrour and dislike which the Indians of South America showed to encounter the shock of the gymnotus, opposed an insurmountable obstacle to the wishes of our author, to have live fish brought to his lodgings at Calabozo; so that he was reduced to the necessity of repairing to the pond where the gymnoti inhabit, to assist at the fishing, and to make his observations on the spot. He was, accordingly, conducted by a party of Indians, to Caro de Beza, a stagnant, muddy pond of water; and there the scene which ensued no less surprised than entertained our travellers; for the Indians began their preparation for catching the gymnoti, by driving about thirty half-broken horses and mules into the water, the banks of which they guarded, and then, by means of their cries, their poles, and harpoons, endeavoured to prevent the retreat of the horses, reluctantly forced to enter the pool. The intention of this stratagem, it seems, is, that in the battle which ensues between the gymnoti and the horses, the former, by the repeated discharges of their electrick organs, may so far exhaust the powers of their shocks, as to be afterwards more safely and easily caught and dragged on shore. Accordingly, no sooner had the Cattle been driven into the water, than the gymnoti, enraged at the intrusion, began hostilities, by discharging their batteries through the breasts and bellies of the enemy, with such frequency and force, as soon completely to overpower both horses and mules. All appeared stunned and alarmed; some fell down, and often disappeared for a while beneath the surface of the water. Two were fairly drowned; and some who, in spite of the vigilance of the bystanders, made their escape, sunk down on the bank, enfeebled and benumbed. When the battle had continued about a quarter of an hour, the eels became in their turn exhausted, and their electrick strokes more and more feeble; while the cattle, sensible of the weakness of the enemy, recovered from their panick, and renewed the combat, till the gymnoti fled before the horses, and approached the banks, where they were easily seized and dragged on shore by the line and harpoon. The electrick strokes communicated by a gymnotus, in full vigour, is sufficiently powerful to stun the sensibility and paralyze the masculine powers of a horse; and such a stroke passed through the belly and chest, would, in the opinion of our observer, be sufficient to kill a man. The stroke received by him, from the comparatively exhausted fish, when first dragged on shore, exceeded in force any he had ever experienced from a large Leyden phial completely charged. On another occasion, the concussion having passed through the lower extremities, he suffered severe pains in the knees, and in almost every joint, during the whole day. The kind of sensation which accompanies the stroke of the gym notus is, he remarks, somewhat different from that received from an electrick conductor from the Leyden phial, or from the voltaick pile. The difference, though distinguishable at all times, is still more remarkable in the strokes of the fish considerably exhausted. A sort of thrilling vibratory sensation is propagated along the touching extremity, and is succeeded by a disagreeable numbness. It seems to be this peculiar sensation that has conferred on the gymnotus the names of tremblador, and anguille tremblant, in the Spanish and French settlements. It is observed by Humboldt, and by Gay Lusac, that the torpedo yields strokes only when the electrick organs are touched; that the stroke is more severe when the whole hand is applied, than when the animal is touched with a single finger; and that when it strikes it is observed to move, convulsively, its pectoral fins. But from every part of the body of the gymnotus, indifferently, strokes may be obtained, as powerful too, from the application of a little finger as of the whole hand; and when the animal strikes, no perceptible motion can be observed. If the brain be destroyed, or the head separated from the body of the gymnotus, the power of communicating shocks is instantly lost; and, though the apparatus remains otherwise entire, no electrick phenomenon can be observed. Nay, the muscles seem now unexcitable, even by artificial, galvanick combinations; for no contractions were observable on arming them in the usual way with zinck and silver; the heart alone could be thus excited. MISCELLANY. THE ART OF IMPROVING TURKISH BEAUTIES. THE students in gastronomy [i. e. the epicures] at Paris, have lately amused themselves with speculations on the mode adopted (as they say) in the seraglio to produce that embonpoint, which is considered as a sine qua non in Turkish beauty. They describe it in, the following manner: These indolent beauties are put into a narrow and feebly enlighted place; are kept almost constantly reclined on well stuffed cushions, and are bound to observe a strict silence. Their only amusement is playing a few notes on the theorbo, beating the tympanum, or adjusting their headdresses before a looking glass. They bathe twice a day; they are wrapped up voluptuously; their fair skin is made extremely smooth and supple by essences, and to render the whole effective, they are crammed with a soup made of maize, sweetened with honey, or sirup of dates. As this is a regular custom among the Asiaticks, it is probable, that the procedure is not without some foundation in nature. Although fashion at present prescribes to our fair readers a certain slenderness of shape, which, in a moderate degree, is graceful, yet when among its revolutions it shall require an embonpoint, we trust they will bear in mind the efficacy of dark rooms, soft cushions, strict silence, and maize soup! Curious Anecdote of L'Abbé Moliere. THE abbé Moliere, who had distinguished himself in France by his observations on the astronomical systems of Descartes, was so extremely simple in his manners, that, taken from astronomy, he was a stranger to every thing. He was so poor, that having no servant, and often not even wood to make a fire, he would study in his bed, in which he would sit up, with his small clothes placed upon his head by way of night cap, the legs hanging over his shoulders; and thus accoutred, pursue the deepest speculations.While writing one morning in this curious position, he heard a knock at the door. "Who is there?" cried the abbé, "come in." A person entered, whom the abbé did not notice, but continued writing, till roused by the intruder, who demanded his money. "Money!" said the astonished Moliere, "Yes, your money," replied the other. "Oh, I understand, you are a thief." "Thief or no thief, I must have money." "Indeed! very well, feel in. this pocket," turning one leg of his small clothes towards the villain. No money was, however, to be found. "Here, then," said the abbé, "take this key; go to that closet, and open the third drawer in the bottom of the bookcase." The thief opened the second. "Ah! leave that alone, those are my papers: don't disturb them: you'll find the money in the next." The thief found it. "Now shut the drawer;" but the other waited not for that ceremony, but betook himself to flight: " Mr. Thief, pray shut the door-diable, he has left it open; what a rascal of a thief! I must get up in the cold to shut it; deuce take him." Thus saying, the abbé jump; ed out of bed, shut the door, and resumed his labours. ANECDOTES. A lady from London was lately taking a rural walk near Chelten ham, and in her devious paths appeared not very scrupulous as to the sacred barrier of hedges, &c. A farmer, who, in an old-fashioned way of thinking, did not exactly see the necessity of his being put to the inconvenience and expense of repairing the prostrate fences, ventured to remonstrate with the fair Celia, who exclaimed, with great simplicity: "Laud a a mercy! I thought the country and the fields was nobody's !" con When queen Elizabeth, in one of her progresses, soon after the defeat of the Spanish Armada, visited Shrewsbury, the mayor, on gratulating her on the memorable Spain attacked your majesty, egad, event, said: "When the king of he took the wrong sow by the ear." The queen could not help smiling at this, and her admiration was further heightened, when, at her departure, he begged permission "to attend her majesty to the gallows!" which stood a mile out of town. HUMANITY OF JUDGE POWELL. Jane Wenham was tried for witchcraft before him; her adversaries swore she could fly: "Prisoner, can you fly?" "Yes, my lord." " Well then, you may; there is no law against flying." She lost her character, but saved her life; for he would not convict even by confes. sion. PASQUALI, THE MUSICIAN. Pasquali, who is, we think, exhibited by Hogarth, in the character Greek street, Soho. He was, we beof the Enraged Musician, resided in lieve, the son of a painter of very considerable merit, particularly in the execution of small, but animated conversation pieces. This excellent artist died about the year 1700. Pasquali the younger, who was |